[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 156 (2010), Part 8]
[House]
[Page 10736]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




         A TRIBUTE TO GOOD BREAD AND A FAMILY OF ENTREPRENEURS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from the Northern Mariana Islands (Mr. Sablan) is recognized 
for 5 minutes.
  Mr. SABLAN. The people of the Northern Mariana Islands love rice. 
Pre-contact with the West, the Marianas were the easternmost extent of 
the cultivation of rice. For us, a meal without rice is no meal.
  Yet, ironically, one of our most cherished local businesses processes 
that great competitor of rice: Wheat bread. Pan mamis and Pan toasta. 
These baked goods bring back mouthwatering memories for all of us in 
the Marianas. And the source of this goodness we most recall is 
Herman's Modern Bakery.
  Perhaps, our devotion to Herman's has to do with the roots of that 
business in the ashes of war. Like the people of Israel beset by the 
Babylonians, as the people of the Marianas emerged from the trauma of 
World War II, ``the famine was sore, so that there was no bread.'' We 
were starving and stored together in an internment camp in the days and 
months following the U.S. victory over the Japanese in 1944.
  But the U.S. forces quickly began reorganizing society and 
reestablishing the ability of our community to care for itself. The 
occupying forces tapped the young Herman Reyes Guerrero to bake. Herman 
had previously apprenticed as a baker during the Japanese 
administration of the Northern Marianas, and he quickly agreed to 
return to this calling. He began baking bread for the U.S. troops, for 
Japanese prisoners of war, and for the Chamorro and Carolinian people 
of Saipan housed by the military in Camp Susupe.
  As often happens after war, much materiel is left behind, cheaper to 
abandon than to return home. So it was at the close of World War II in 
the Pacific that the United States Navy simply gave Herman Guerrero the 
baking equipment the military had supplied for him to use.

                              {time}  1830

  With those ovens and mixers and the customer base he had already 
established, Herman opened Herman's Bakery. Not only was this the first 
bakery, this was the very first company founded in our postwar economy.
  As the years went by, from that base of bread and baked goods, 
Herman's business grew. He opened the first hotel on the island of 
Saipan, a retail store, a laundromat, and a travel agency. In the early 
1980s, following extensive expansion and upgrading, the bakery became 
known as Herman's Modern Bakery, and its products became ubiquitous 
throughout Micronesia. Today, the company's distribution chain includes 
several international franchises. You can even find Herman's cookies 
for sale on the Internet.
  One of Herman Guerrero's fondest memories of his early baking career 
was a visit to the shop by Admiral Chester Nimitz, and throughout the 
following 65-plus years of growth, the close relationship between the 
United States military and the bakery continued. Today, as the U.S. 
build-up commences on Guam, Herman's has contracted as an authorized 
supplier, opening up a distribution facility and considering a bakery 
there. Herman's also regularly supplies the U.S. naval vessels that 
dock in Saipan for R&R. For just as many residents like to make 
Herman's our last stop on the drive to the airport--to take pan mamis, 
guzuria and crocks of cookies away as gifts and comfort foods from 
home--so, too, the sailors of the U.S. fleet enjoy pulling away from 
the dock with Herman's sweets stocked in the galley.
  From a humble one-man beginning, today, Herman provides jobs for over 
110 individuals. A leading corporate citizen, Herman's is a strong 
supporter of civic, charitable, educational, and religious 
organizations, including the American Red Cross, the Commonwealth 
Health Center, the Rotary Club, the Northern Marianas College 
Foundation, the Saipan Chamber of Commerce, and nearly every school, 
church, and village fiesta on the islands of Saipan, Tinian, and Rota. 
The company piloted our school lunch program and has provided technical 
expertise to individuals on other islands in Micronesia who are opening 
or improving their own bakeries. With the recent establishment of the 
distribution center on Guam, the company has begun to expand its 
charitable support to that island, too.
  Always, the bakery remains the heart of the family of companies and 
of the family of Herman Guerrero himself. All of the surviving children 
of Herman and his wife, Maria Tenorio Guerrero--Jesus, Agnes, Herman 
Jr., Juan, Florencio, Margarita, Anna, Rudolfo, Joseph, and Leonora--
have worked at the bakery during significant portions of their adult 
lives. Herman was so identified with the bakery business that he came 
to be called by the nickname ``Pan,'' which in the Chamorro language 
means ``bread.'' Indeed, to this day, many of his children carry the 
``Pan'' honorific as part of their own everyday names. For most of us 
in the Northern Mariana Islands, when we hear the word ``pan,'' it's a 
tossup which comes first to mind: Herman Reyes Guerrero--Herman 
``Pan''--and his wonderful bakery, or just the wonderful baked goods 
that ``Pan'' produced.
  Dangkulo na si yu`us ma`ase.

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